A British judge warns lawyers of the danger of citing cases created by ai.

 On Friday the Supreme Court in London sent a clear message that if lawyers use AI to quote fake cases they could get into serious trouble facing contempt of court or even criminal charges. This really shows how misleading generative AI can be for legal folks.

A senior judge took aim at lawyers in two specific cases who seemed to depend on AI tools to come up with arguments based on made-up legal precedents. She pushed for regulators and leaders in the field to make sure that lawyers understand their ethical responsibilities. Judge Victoria Sharp wrote in a ruling that if AI is misused it could have serious consequences for justice and public trust in the legal system according to Reuters.

She pointed out that right away practical and effective actions need to be taken by those in the legal field who have leadership roles and by those in charge of supervising legal services.

This ruling comes on the heels of lawyers around the world having to explain their use of fake legal references since generative AI tools like ChatGPT hit the scene about two years ago.

Sharp cautioned that lawyers who cite fake cases are violating their duty to not mislead the court which could lead to contempt of court. She also mentioned that in really bad cases presenting false info to the court to mess with justice is a criminal act under common law basically obstruction of justice.

She acknowledged that legal and judicial regulators have provided guidelines on AI use for lawyers but stressed that just having guidelines isn’t enough to tackle the problem of AI misuse.